8. Billy Martin

Billy Martin was known for two things as a big league manager: turning laughable teams into competitors, and his fiery temper. Martin was World Series MVP in 1953, an All-Star in ’56 and led the Yankees to consecutive pennants in ’76 and ’77. But nothing could prepare baseball fans for his untimely death on Christmas Day in 1989. After a night of heavy drinking, the 61-year-old Martin was traveling home with his friend, William Reedy, when Reedy’s truck crashed, killing the former Yankees manager. The epitaph on Martin’s headstone reads: “I may not have been the greatest Yankee to put on the uniform but I was the proudest.”